Wacousta : a tale of the Pontiac conspiracy — Volume 3 eBook

Captain Blessington now quitted the room, and Sir
Everard, relieved from the restraining presence of
his companions, gave free vent to his emotion, throwing
himself upon the body of his friend, and giving utterance
to the feelings of anguish that oppressed his heart.

He had continued some minutes in this position, when
he fancied he felt the warm tears of a human being
bedewing a hand that reposed on the neck of his unfortunate
friend. He looked up, and, to his infinite surprise,
beheld Clara de Haldimar standing before him at the
opposite side of the bed. Her likeness to her
brother, at that moment, was so striking, that, for
a second or two, the irrepressible thought passed
through the mind of the officer, it was not a living
being he gazed upon, but the immaterial spirit of
his friend. The whole attitude and appearance
of the wretched girl, independently of the fact of
her noiseless entrance, tended to favour the delusion.
Her features, of an ashy paleness, seemed fixed, even
as those of the corpse beneath him; and, but for the
tears that coursed silently down her cheek, there
was scarcely an outward evidence of emotion. Her
dress was a simple white robe, fastened round her
waist with a pale blue riband; and over her shoulders
hung her redundant hair, resembling in colour, and
disposed much in the manner of that of her brother,
which had been drawn negligently down to conceal the
wound on his brow. For some moments the baronet
gazed at her in speechless agony. Her tranquil
exterior was torture to him; for he, feared it betokened
some alienation of reason. He would have preferred
to witness the most hysteric convulsion of grief,
rather than that traitorous calm; and yet he had not
the power to seek to remove it.

“You are surprised to see me here, mingling
my grief with yours, Sir Everard,” she at length
observed, with the same calm mien, and in tones of
touching sweetness. “I came, with my father’s
permission, to take a last farewell of him whose death
has broken my heart. I expected to be alone;
but—­Nay, do not go,” she added, perceiving
that the officer was about to depart. “Had
you not been here, I should have sent for you; for
we have both a sacred duty to perform. May I
not ask your hand?”

More and more dismayed at her collected manner, the
young officer gazed at her with the deepest sorrow
depicted in every line of his own countenance.
He extended his hand, and Clara, to his surprise,
grasped and pressed it firmly.

“It was the wish of this poor boy that his Clara
should be the wife of his friend, Sir Everard.
Did he ever express such to you?”

“It was the fondest desire of his heart,”
returned the baronet, unable to restrain the emotion
of joy that mingled, despite of himself, with his
worst apprehensions.

“I need not ask how you received his proposal,”
continued Clara, with the same calmness of manner.
“Last night,” she pursued solemnly, “I
was the bride of the murderer of my brother, of the
lover of my mother,—­tomorrow night I may
be the bride of death; but to-night I am the bride
of my brother’s friend. Yes, here am I come
to pledge myself to the fulfilment of his wish.
If you deem a heart-broken girl not unworthy of you,
I am your wife, Sir Everard; and, recollect, it is
a solemn pledge, that which a sister gives over the
lifeless body of a brother, beloved as this has been.”